what wind is to fire
by hoidn
Summary: Sully comes home from Nevada.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N **At the end of 'Promises, Promises' Sully goes to Nevada. In 'Expedition' we learn he was gone for a month. And I said to myself, THAT SEX MUST'VE BEEN SPECTACULAR. So, uh, here we are. I am, apparently, shameless.

If you do not want to read about married people who love each other having sex then you should hit the back button now.

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><p><em>We found our own O my soul in the calm and cool of the daybreak.<em>

"Welcome home."

Sully jumped down from the train to see Matthew's grinning face. "Good to be home," he said as they shook hands. He shouldered his bags, feeling the weight almost like a part of himself after carrying them with him for so long.

Horace walked out of the conductor's office with a broad smile. "It's sure good to have you back, Sully. But I thought you wasn't comin' til tomorrow."

"It's a surprise for Dr Mike," Matthew said. "So you can't say nothin'."

"Oh, I won't. You can count on me." Horace's smile stretched even wider. "Dr Mike's gonna be real pleased."

"Hope so," Sully said, with his own grin.

He and Matthew stepped from the platform into the morning sun. "Dr Mike's at the clinic," Matthew told him as they crossed the tracks. "She don't suspect a thing and Colleen made sure she's got no appointments this mornin'."

"I owe you."

"You don't owe us. We all just want her to be happy. She's been kinda low since you been gone. She tries to hide it, but..." He shrugged. "It's good you're back. I just can't believe Brian kept his mouth shut."

Sully chuckled. "What did you bribe him with?"

"Candy," said Matthew with a laugh. "What else?"

It was still early enough in Colorado Springs that there weren't too many people about. Matthew and Sully took the long way to the clinic, avoiding the general store and Grace's. Sully felt like he'd been gone a lot longer than three weeks, but the town looked just the same as when he left.

The clinic was casting a wide shadow when they reached its western side. Matthew held his hand out for Sully's bags. "I'll take 'em to the wagon."

"Thanks." Sully rolled his shoulders to ease the muscles, a new tension growing in him as he looked up at the clinic windows. He glanced back at Matthew. "For everything."

The younger man just grinned. "See you tonight at supper."

Sully watched Matthew walk away, finding himself unaccountably nervous. He'd spent four weeks missing Michaela, wanting her, writing her letters that he never sent. The urge to get home had driven him on for days of little sleep, just so he could be here sooner. To surprise her, yes, but mostly because he was so desperate to see her. And now he stood leaning against the wall of the clinic, imagining he could feel her through the wood, shaken by the need inside him. No one had ever had the kind of power over him that she did, that he'd fought for so long. Even now, the wonder and the terror of it could still surprise him.

The door to the clinic was propped open when Sully stepped silently onto the porch. Michaela was framed by the doorway, sitting at her desk, absorbed in reading and taking notes. She was turned slightly towards him and he could see the little crease between her brows that appeared when she was concentrating. The light from the window behind her lit up her hair, highlighting its yellows and gold. She wore it over one shoulder in a thick braid, with strands escaping here and there as they always did, no matter how she tried to tame them.

Somehow she was even more beautiful than he remembered.

For a few seconds he just stood, watching her, love overwhelming him with its intensity. It grabbed him sometimes that way, just grabbed him. He thought he should be used to it by now, but it could still swamp him.

"Mornin'," he said casually, leaning against the doorframe, and grinned when her head shot up.

"Sully?" She stared at him in disbelief. "How did— your telegram said you wouldn't be home until tomorrow."

"Thought I'd surprise you. Want me to go back?"

She blinked then gave a little hiccuping laugh. "Don't you dare," she said and all but flung herself into his arms. She wrapped herself around him and pressed her face against his shoulder. "I missed you. I missed you so much."

"I missed you." He held her tightly, running both hands up and down her back, taking in as much of her as he could. The scent of her filled his lungs. Closing his eyes, he dropped his face into the curve of her neck and sighed. This was what he'd been missing all those miles; this was his whole world.

They stayed that way for a while, just holding on to each other, until the stroking of his hands over her slowed into something more deliberate. Michaela arched against him slightly and the air around them turned charged the way it did before a storm. Sully lifted his head and kissed the spot just above the fabric of her collar. "I missed you," he whispered again, then opened his mouth to suck lightly on the flesh he'd kissed.

A breath shivered out of her with his name, her hands tightening on him. She turned her face to his and desire blazed through him as their mouths met. They kissed like they could crawl inside each other, fuse together into one being.

Sully's only coherent thought was that he had to touch her. He needed his hands on her skin, nothing between them. He took a step, backing her up, and they stumbled further into the clinic, still kissing. Michaela was making soft sounds in her throat that went straight to the heavy ache in his groin. He picked her up and set her on the desk, holding her hips tightly against his. Reaching down, he began working her skirt up over her knees.

With a start, Michaela wrenched her mouth away from his. "The door." Her darkened eyes met his as if she expected him to understand. But he didn't care about any door. He stroked the backs of her knees and bent to kiss her again. "Sully, we have to shut the door," she said, insistent, wriggling free from his arms.

The clinic door, he realised, which was open so that anyone could walk by and see them. He took a deep breath, feeling a little guilty, a little embarrassed that he'd been so caught up in her he hadn't thought of it himself.

He watched as she shifted the heavy book propping the door with her foot, admiring the glimpse of slender ankle. The door swung shut and she fumbled with the lock, finally sliding it into place, then turned, her back against the wood. She was flushed, her mouth open, her hair escaping its braid, and she was beautiful, his wife.

She smiled at him and he was lost again.

With two steps he was close enough to touch her. He reached out to trail one finger down the buttons on her blouse, from high at her throat to where they disappeared into her skirt. His short nail made a ticking sound against each one. When his hand reached her waist, he slid it sideways, curving up and over the delicate rise of her ribs until his fingers rested just beneath her breast. He could feel her heart thudding under his palm.

Another step and he was pressing her against the door with his body. Michaela closed her eyes and arched her head back, pushing herself against him and exposing her soft white throat. Sully bent his head to lick her where the hot blood ran under her skin. His hands moved to cup her face, fingers sliding into her hair as his tongue slid into her mouth and his hips rocked, rocked, rocked against hers. He stopped thinking about anything but the feel of her in his hands, her hot little tongue in his mouth.

He had her blouse almost entirely unbuttoned before her fingers covered his. "Wait, we can't—" she whispered, then moaned as he began to kiss his way across her throat to her ear. "Not here" she said, breathless.

It took him a second to focus when he pulled back this time. Her lips were wet and swollen and a soft flush rose from her neck into her cheeks. Sully had to close his eyes against the force of his desire. Of course they couldn't. Not in the clinic. Fighting for control, he eased away and braced his hands on either side of her against the door. "Sorry," he said, trying to steady his breathing.

"There's no need to be sorry," she said softly. He felt her kiss his hand and then the withdrawal of her warmth as she slipped out from under his arms. The loss almost hurt.

He pushed off from the door to stand straight and scrubbed his hands over his face. When he looked to Michaela, her blouse was still undone and she was watching him with a small, secret smile playing around her mouth. She took his hand between both of hers and pulled him backwards into the hallway. His breath clogged in his throat when he understood where she was leading him.

With the door closed, the air of the recovery room was still and hushed. In the dim light, Sully watched as she slid the blouse from her shoulders and placed it over the chair, as she sat and unlaced her boots. He was entranced by the grace of her movements, the faint glow of her skin, the look in her eyes as she came to stand before him. The look that was only for him.

Her hands cupped his face, her soft fingers tracing along his jaw as she guided him down to her mouth. Sully tried to hold back, to slow himself down, but the need inside him reared up, ferocious. He gripped the fabric of her skirt, pulling her tightly against him, and she rose up on her toes to kiss him fiercely. The world narrowed to their mouths, their hands, as they fumbled with buttons and closures.

"You wear too many clothes," he muttered and she answered with a sound that was half-laugh, half-moan.

Finally, finally, they tumbled onto the bed, skin to skin, bodies straining for purchase. He tried to reach between them to touch her but she shook her head and wrapped her legs around him.

"Please," she said. "I need you."

It was happening too fast. He was right on the edge and he had to wait, had to give her pleasure first. But her hips shifted, guiding him, and she took him in and in, and he didn't have the strength to resist what he wanted so badly. She moved, he moved, every pulse a sharp spear of sensation so intense it was almost unbearable. Her body was hot and soft and liquid around him and he drowned in her gladly. Everything was too much, too good. The way she arched against him, the salty taste of her skin, the sounds in her throat, her hands on him. He couldn't think, couldn't breathe, couldn't stop. When she shuddered and cried out, contracting around him, it tore through him, blazing like the sun, the searing white heat of his release.

They lay together for a moment, breathless. Then she started laughing against his shoulder.

"What's so funny?" he mumbled.

"I think we set a speed record this time."

"Would've been faster if you didn't wear all those clothes."

She slapped his arm lightly, still laughing. "Just for that, you're going to help me tidy up."

He lifted his head to look down at her beautiful, smiling face. "I suppose that's fair," he agreed, sweeping the hair from her cheek. "And then what'll we do?"

"Well, since there's been a conspiracy to keep my schedule free this morning, I thought it would be nice to go home."

"I'd like that." He laid his brow gently against hers and closed his eyes. "Let's go home."

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><p>The title comes from Roger de Bussy-Rabutin: "Absence is to love what wind is to a fire; it puts out the little, it kindles the great". The epigraph is by Walt Whitman from Song of Myself.<p>

Many thanks to Jacks for beta reading and being generally awesome.


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N** I probably should have mentioned in the first section that this is a multi-part thing. So, let's pretend I did that! Thanks again to Jacks, who generously flails at the right moments, and smacks me around when I forget I'm supposed to be in Sully's head.

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><p><em>For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you. <em>

Light filled their bedroom, pooling here and there on the floor and making the smooth wood glow. In the months it had taken him to build the house, Sully had imagined it just like this: the early sun shining in as it rose over the mountains. He'd wanted them to wake to the promise of every new morning.

The morning wasn't so new now, but the light still slanted in from the east, the sun not yet directly overhead. A shaft of that light lay on one of his wife's bare feet where it peeked out from under her skirt. She sat on the end of the bed, watching him unpack like it was the most interesting thing she'd ever seen. He was no better, he thought. He would've been finished by now if he could stop himself touching her every few minutes.

Michaela eyed the small pile of wrapped parcels he'd placed in the corner. "Are you sure I can't open it now?"

It was the third time she'd asked. "You'll get your present at supper like everyone else."

She tilted her head and gave him a winsome look. "Please?"

"That ain't gonna work this time," he said, dropping a kiss on the tip of her nose. The trouble was it _had_ worked, all too well, in the past. Just after she'd come back from Boston was the first time she'd used it and almost felled him. Made his blood run hot and the breath catch in his throat. Michaela Quinn didn't use her feminine wiles much but when she did they were potent.

To distract her, he pointed at one of the bags, still half full. "Those are the clean ones."

With a little huff, she reached in and began pulling out neatly folded clothes, passing them to him to put away. Sully had his back to her and his hands in the drawer when he heard rustling.

"What's this?" she asked.

His stomach sank. He'd thought he put that in the other bag, the one that sat safely by the door. "That's nothin'," he said, moving to take the packet she was examining. "Just some papers."

She held on to it. "It's addressed to me."

Defeated, he shrugged. "It's a letter I wrote you, that's all."

"You wrote to me?" Her face lit up and she began unfolding the pages. Sully reached out to stop her.

"Don't."

It wasn't loud or harsh, but the word seemed to hang in the air after he'd said it. Frustrated with himself and more than a little embarrassed at his reaction, Sully walked to the window and stared out, seeing nothing.

"Why don't you want me to read it?" Michaela asked quietly.

He didn't know how to explain it to her. What he'd written were the sorts of things he might say to her when they were lying together late at night. Things that were whispered in the dark, that could only be said skin against skin. Just having them down on paper made him feel exposed. To think of her reading them in the bright morning light the way she would a letter from one of her sisters — it was too much.

"I just missed you," he began, tracing the edge of the window frame with his thumb. "So I wrote and told you that. Only it didn't seem like much of a letter, so I waited. After a while, it got to be more a way of talkin' to you, it made me feel like you weren't so far away, and I didn't want to give that up. So I never sent it." There was a knot in his gut and he felt almost painfully foolish, admitting he was no better than a lovesick boy. "It ain't a proper letter, anyway. It ain't even finished."

The soft sound of bare feet against the floor broke the silence as Michaela came to stand behind him. Her arms slipped around his waist and she pressed herself against his back. "I love that you wrote to me. And I would love to read it. But if it makes you uncomfortable, then I won't. Those words, those thoughts, whatever they are, belong to you. I don't want to take them from you."

Sully closed his eyes and breathed out slowly. Sometimes her sweet generosity still surprised him. Not that she had it in her but that he could doubt it or forget it. The trust between them had been there from the beginning, the thread that wove through everything they were to each other. And it was all hers, everything he was.

He turned and wrapped his arms around her, looking down into her solemn face. "I wrote it for you. I want you to read it. Just... not yet."

"All right," she said gently. "Give it to me when you're ready."

He nodded and rested his brow against hers, closing his eyes.

Her hand rose to lie warmly along the side of his face and he nuzzled her palm. "You must be exhausted."

"Must be," he agreed, turning slightly to kiss the inside of her wrist. He felt the little laugh that shook her and then her hands reaching back to take his own.

She tugged lightly. "Come sit down."

He followed obediently, sitting, and she came to stand between his splayed legs. He closed his eyes again as her fingers ran along his shoulders and up into his hair. His arms went around her waist, hands exploring the arch of her spine and the dip and flare of her hips like she was a landscape he was mapping in the dark. No matter how hard he'd tried all those nights in Nevada, nothing in his memory had come close to what it felt like to actually hold her.

His head fell forward to rest against her as she stroked his neck, her cool fingers kindling a flame inside him that began to burn away his weariness. Sully lifted his head and reached up to undo the buttons at her neck, pulling the fabric aside until he could press his face against the warm hollow at her throat. "I missed the way you smell," he murmured. "I bought some of your fancy soap 'cause it smelled like you."

She rested her cheek on the top of his head and he could hear her smile. "I took one of your shirts out of the washing and slept in it because it smelled like you."

He kissed the flesh under his mouth, nosing her blouse further aside to find more skin. "Wish I'd seen that."

"If you'd been here, I wouldn't have had to wear it," she said and he felt the vibration of the words against his lips as they slid up her throat.

When her head fell back, his mouth roved to the delicate place under her chin, her jaw. Against his cheek, her skin was downy, warm and sweet like a ripe peach. He leaned up to lick the tiny lobe of her ear, taking it into his mouth, grazing it lightly with his teeth. Michaela moaned softly.

Sully opened his eyes to look at her. Her own were closed and a faint flush was spreading across her face and chest. He pressed kisses downwards as he undid the rest of her buttons.

This time they would go slower.

"Turn around," he said. "Let me take your hair out."

With her back to him, he pulled at the tie holding her braid in place. The strands began to unravel, slightly curled. He combed his fingers through them, watching them spill like waves over his wrists. Light played on the thick copper twists of it and made them ripple like a waterfall.

Easing her forward slightly, he stood and pressed a kiss to the nape of her neck. He slid the blouse from her arms and let it drop to the floor, then unfastened her skirt. Kneeling, he drew it down with all the layers underneath until they puddled around her feet.

"That's a little more than taking my hair out." Michaela's voice was low and amused.

Rising slowly, his hands followed a leisurely path from her ankles to the petal-soft skin of her thighs. "Want me to stop?"

"No," she said, leaning into his touch.

Her desire was a powerful force. She could set his blood humming with a look, a single word. He drew back quickly to strip off his shirt and she turned, rising on her toes to kiss him as it fell away. They fumbled with the last of their clothing, a familiar urgency building with their movements. Michaela slid onto the bed and Sully followed her down, joined by mouth and hands, unwilling to separate even for a moment.

_Slower_, he reminded himself. On his elbows above her, he cupped her face between his palms and kissed her with all the longing he'd felt with so many miles, so many weeks between them. Her hands roved over him, touching everywhere she could reach, like she was mapping him, too, like she was claiming him.

Pulling away from her mouth, Sully trailed his lips across her collarbones and down to the sweet curves of her breasts. She arched up under light flicks of his tongue, the gentle scrape of his teeth, her hands holding tight to his arms. Slowly, slowly, he made his way down her body until he could press his face into her belly and inhale the dark, secret smell of her. He licked a stripe up to her belly button and she whimpered.

He sat back on his heels, taking in the sight of her: her hair spread wildly across the pillows, her eyes dark and fixed on his, her nipples taut and rosy. So beautiful. He stroked the inside of her thighs from her knees to the creases at her hips. She whispered his name, her breath coming light and fast through parted lips. Bending down again, never breaking her gaze, Sully placed soft, open-mouthed kisses along the paths his hands had traced, taking his time, feeling the tension in her body, the anticipation. Feeling it in his own.

When he couldn't stand it anymore, he put his mouth on her.

Her taste exploded on his tongue, thick and tart. She was slick and swollen, hot as a fever, hot as the blood in his veins. He lapped at her greedily, tongue curling, sliding, seeking out the places that made her gasp, made her writhe. Her feet pressed against his flanks, toes curling against his ribs while her thighs trembled around his head. He held her hips as he drove her with his mouth, his tongue, driving himself, need twisting in him sharply, her little choked cries setting him on fire, on and on until he heard her voice break — _oh God, oh_ — felt her stiffen, and then the pulsing pleasure that rocked her in his arms.

He stayed with her until her body relaxed and her legs slid off his shoulders. Michaela reached for him and he moved into her, sinking into the wet heat of her body his mouth had just left. Her arms came around him, her legs twining with his, and her hands spread across his back, gliding down to stroke the spot at the base of his spine that sent arrows of heat straight to his groin. He moaned and thrust his hips into her helplessly, the edges of his thoughts blurring.

She lifted up to kiss him, her tongue flicking at his lips, licking at her own taste on his mouth, and Sully lost control. He surged into her over and over and she met him at each thrust, opening her heart to him as well as her body. Love welled up in him, woven with the pleasure, and then broke like a raincloud, bursting through him with the sweetest agony of his life.

For a few moments all he could do was hold himself up on shaking arms. When he opened his eyes, he found Michaela smiling up at him sleepily. Sully leaned down to kiss her softly, then slid bonelessly to lie beside her. She turned to nestle down beside him with a sigh.

This was his favourite part of being with her, these quiet after times. When they lay together, drifting in contentment, and he was steeped in the simple and necessary comfort of touching her. Holding her this way satisfied some deep and elemental part of him that had been hidden until he met Michaela Quinn. With her he was whole and home.

He felt a heaviness in his body signalling sleep as he trailed his hand slowly through her long hair. From the way she lay against him, he knew she was almost asleep herself. "When do you need to be back at the clinic?" he asked.

"Not for a few hours." Her voice was muffled against his chest.

Sully shifted them slightly into a more comfortable position and closed his eyes. After a few moments he heard the sleepy murmur of his wife's voice. "So there's still time for me to open my present before we go."

He snorted a laugh into her hair, feeling the curve of her lips against his skin. He was still smiling as he slipped gently into sleep.


End file.
